Trend Micro gets aggressive over channel expansion

Signaling an aggressive channel sales plan for this financial year, Trend
Micro is looking at maximizing its channel base in India by expanding across
verticals and doubling its channel base. The anti-virus major has been in India
for the last 12 years. Now, with its renewed channel focus and improvised
product suites, the company is planning to emerge stronger in the market and is
targeting a growth of 15-25 percent YoY.

Speaking about the company's plans to expand their base in the consumer
verticals Amit Nath, Country Manager, Trend Micro explained, “We conducted a
study of the markets and have selected 25 cities in India where we can build a
strong base. These cities have a strong purchasing power, a more IT literate
population and major demographic changes are taking place. We are already strong
in the BFSI, telecom, BPO, ITES and retail sector and besides maintaining our
strong hold in these sectors; we are aggressive of adding more sectors in the
portfolio this FY.”

Talking about the companies channel policies Nath added, “Trend Micro India
has a comprehensive partner program and there are different kinds of partners in
the program. This partner program is based on a 5C model of coverage,
credibility, competence, credit rating, and commitment. We evaluate partners
consistently every quarter on these pillars.“

In the channel structure, the company has three prominent layers; Affinity
One, Affinity Plus and Affinity, where each type of its channel partner handles
different profiles of customers and has different value propositions and
benefits from Trend Micro on the same. “Right now as part of our current channel
recruitment drive our focus in on volume channels and in particular on partners
who can drive our consumer products in India,” Nath added.

Keeping in mind its need to target channel partners more aggressively, the
company has announced that it will be conducting channel events across India and
will be focusing on training channel partners to make them understand the
products better.

Elaborating about the plans Nath said, “India is an important market for us.
In our attempt to maximize our channel base, we will be holding training
programs and channel events across India this FY and will be exploring new
verticals. For the next 12 months, we will continue to reinforce our plans of
adding new channel partners across India.”

The company has already started the event initiative in South and West India
and is planning to take it to the eastern markets soon. The cities which are on
its radar initially are Chandigarh, Jaipur and Ludhiana. Also on the anvil are
Madurai, Nagpur, Pune, Ahmedabad, Surat, Baroda, Coimbatore, Vizag, Lucknow,
Varanasi, Kolkata, Bhuvaneshwar, Guhawati, Bhopal, Indore, Gwalior, Cochin,
Ranchi, Hyderabad, Kanpur and Mumbai.